Federal efforts to bail out small businesses have done a lot of good. But is everyone receiving funds actually a small business? 

We are closer to answers now that the Treasury Department has released a list of every business that has received a loan greater than $150,000 through the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Payment Protection Program (PPP).

“We are particularly pleased that 27% of the program’s reach in low and moderate income communities which is in proportion to percentage of population in these areas,” Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said, “The average loan size is approximately $100,000, demonstrating that the program is serving the smallest of businesses.”

If it’s true that the average PPP loan is $100,000, that’s a good sign, but not all-telling. More analysis of the data is required to give the whole story, such as the median loan size. But while the federal government appears to be pleased with its results, small businesses are hurting -- especially minority and women-owned businesses, as our previous reporting shows.

Moreover, the $100,000 per-loan doesn’t mean per-business necessarily. That’s thanks to three words put into the legislation that gave birth to the PPP. Large restaurant and hotel chains were allowed to apply for PPP loans so long as they had fewer than 500 employees “per physical location.”

“Essentially a combination of wealthy special interests together with well-placed contributors at a critical moment bought a revision to our stimulus package that defined small business as including big business because they owned large franchises made up of hundreds of smaller entities,” Beth Rotman, National Director of Money in Politics & Ethics at Common Cause, told the Daily Beast.

And even if the results are “good,” are they enough? Researchers at Harvard University believe that almost 110,000 small businesses across the US permanently shut down between early March and early May, Finance & Commerce reports.

Meanwhile, shortly after the Treasury data was released, reports began surfacing which criticized the Payment Protection Program for sending large loans to the “political elite.”

The sheer hypocrisy of it all is perhaps laid most bare by a loan of over $150,000 that went to The Americans for Tax Reform Foundation, an organization headed by Grover Norquist that advocates for less spending from the government. The Payment Protection Program is the most costly of the federal government’s coronavirus relief programs, accounting for about 26 percent of total appropriations according to the Government Accountability Office.

Identified by The Daily Beast, several businesses tied to Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, also took loans. One non-profit organization owned by David Bossie, a former Trump campaign official, also got loans from the SBA.

As with many things in Washington, a little digging shows the issue actually spans both sides of the aisle. Two different firms, Precision Strategies and Fenway Strategies, were both founded by Obama alumnus and received PPP loans while former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s “high-powered” consultancy firm also got PPP loans. 

While presidential candidate Joe Biden no longer has a financial interest in the firm, Monzack Mersky McLaughlin and Browder, a firm he founded which maintains strong ties to him and his businesses, got between $150,000 and $350,000.

Meanwhile, a business partially owned by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband received federal relief.

The New York Post reports: “companies owned by or associated with Reps. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.), Kevin Hern (R-Okla.), Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) and Rick Allen (R-Ga.) also received the coronavirus loans. Businesses linked to Reps. Roger Williams (R-Texas), Vicky Hartzler (R-Mo.), Susie Lee (D-Nev.) and Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (D-Fla.)  previously reported they got loans.”